Union Catalogue of Manuscripts from the Islamicate World

Persian MS 840 (The John Rylands Research Institute and Library, The University of Manchester)

Persian Manuscripts

Contents

Summary of Contents: This manuscript contains three works, a complete copy of the Dīvān of Bābā Faghānī Shīrāzī (‎d. 1519) together with the Dīvān of Vaḥshī and an incomplete copy of the latter's romance of Farhād and Shīrīn. A scribe named Muḥammad Ṣadiq completed the volume in the Mughal capital Lahore, on 27 Ṣafar 1044 AH (22 Aug 1634 CE), to which an illuminator added three elegant headpieces at the start of each work therein.
Language(s): Persian
Incipit: (basmala) برگ ۱پ (folio 1b):
Explicit: برگ ۸۹ر (folio 89a):
Colophon: برگ ۸۹ر (folio 89a): تمت النسخه بتاریخ ۲۷ شهر صفر یوم دوشنبه سنه ۱۰۴۴در دار الخلافت بله لاهور تحریر یافت کاتبه فقیر محمد صادق. هر که خواند دعا طمع دارم * زآنکه من بنده کند کارم.
Colophon: Completed by Muḥammad Ṣadiq in the Mughal capital Lahore, on 27 Ṣafar 1044 AH (22 Aug 1634 CE).
Title: Dīvān
Title: ديوان
Incipit: (basmala) برگ ۹۰پ (folio 90b):
Explicit: برگ ۱۵۶ر (folio 156a):
Colophon: تم بالخیر کتبه العبد الفقیر محمد کاتب اللاری سنة ثمان وثلاثين وتسعماية
Incipit: (basmala) برگ ۱۵۷پ (folio 157b):
Explicit: برگ ۱۸۷پ (folio 187b):
Colophon: Colophon missing.

Physical Description

Form: codex
Support: Textblock of cross-grained, externally sized and polished, ivoury-coloured paper probably handmade in the Indian subcontinent with ~7 laid lines per cm and few discernible chain lines.
Extent: 187 folios, 2 flyleaves (ff. i + 187 + i).
Dimensions (leaf): 213 × 108 mm.
Dimensions (written): 145 × 64 mm.
Folios 157b onwards comparatively narrowly ruled
Dimensions (written): 145 × 54 mm.
Foliation: Inconsistent modern pencilled Arabic numerals added to the upper-left corners of the a sides on the initial forty folios, followed by every ten, as well as at the beginning and of the subsequent two work works, only miscounted ‘189’ on the reversse of folio 187b.

Collation

Undetermined. Catchwords throughout most of the lower-left corners of the b sides.

Condition

Handle text with caution. In fair but stable condition, with excessive degradation and tears on the opening folios, but thereafter in better condition, albeit stained.

Layout

Written in 1 to 2 columns with 17 lines per page. Ruled with a misṭarah hand guide.

Hand(s)

Written in clear black nasta‘līq by Muḥammad Ṣadiq.

Decoration

Illumination: Folios 1b, 90b, and 157b bear scalloped domed headpieces with gilt palmette foliate scrollwork on an ultramarine ground and an uninscribed central cartouche, and four vertical radiating lines.
1b: 102 × 62 mm.
90b: 121 × 62 mm.
157b: 88 × 55 mm.

Ruling: Folios 1b and 2a ruled in gold outlined with thin black lines, and surrounded by another single line. The margins of folios 2b onwards ruled with single lines of ultramarine blue.

Additions:
Inscriptions:
  • The right flyleaf a side (f. ia) bears .
  • Folios 10a and b inscribed with .
Bookplates: The left pastedown: ‘Bibliotheca Lindesiana’ with pencilled shelfmark ‘2/K’, and ‘Bland MSS No. 327’, with the name and number crossed out and ‘Persian’ and ‘123’ written aside.

Binding

Probably rebound in Britain.

British-made thin-weight, cream-coloured wove endpapers added to the beginning and end. Resewn on three recessed cords laced into pastebaords. Edges trimmed, spattered gray-blue, with blue and white striped cloth endbands adhered to head and tail. Covered in half marbled calf leather, tigh-backed and tight-jointed, with Empire-patterned marbled paper sides and squares along the edges.

Spine panels paletted with gold single fillet lines. A red goatskin skiver label titled with two of the three works within the volume.

219 × 123 × 25 mm.

Handle binding with caution. In fair but stable condition, with extensive abrasion to the exterior.

Seal(s):

Many folios throughout bear repeated black oval seal impressions in three stacked nasta‘līq lines with displaced letters, double ruled, read from right to left, then down and up at the end. with the name of a former owner Suhrāb bin Rustam dated [1]121 AH (1709–1710 CE)
‘عبده سهراب بن رستم’
12 × 20 mm.

History

Origin: Completed by Muḥammad Ṣadiq in the Mughal capital Lahore; , on 27 Ṣafar 1044 AH (22 Aug 1634 CE).

Provenance and Acquisition

Subsequently owned by one Suhrāb bin Rustam who repeatedly impressed his seal throughout the volume.

While the circumstances under which this volume arrived in Britain remain unclear, King's College Professor of Oriental Languages Duncan Forbes (1798–1868), who describes the volume in his published catalogue (p. 69, nos. 209 and 209a), before he sold his manuscript collection to his publisher W. H. Allen & Co. in exchange for an annuity. Subsequently sold by that firm to Alexander Lindsay, 25th Earl of Crawford (1812–1880) in 1866

Purchased by Enriqueta Rylands (1843–1908) in 1901 from James Ludovic Lindsay, 26th Earl of Crawford (1847–1913).

Bequeathed by Enriqueta Rylands (1843–1908) in 1908 to the John Rylands Library, Manchester.

Record Sources

Bibliographical description based on an index created by Reza Navabpour circa 1993, derived from a manuscript catalogue by Michael Kerney, circa 1890s, concisely published as Bibliotheca Lindesiana, Hand-list of Oriental Manuscripts: Arabic, Persian, Turkish, 1898.

Subsequently augmented and enhanced by Jake Benson in 2023 with reference to the manuscript in hand.

Availability

To book an in-person or online appointment to consult the manuscript, visit Using the Special Collections Reading Rooms. For any other enquiries please email uml.special-collections@manchester.ac.uk.

Funding of Cataloguing

Iran Heritage Foundation

The John Rylands Research Institute

The Soudavar Memorial Foundation


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